Cakeday

[ptodd]

Happy birthday, @kelley1 !!! Hope it was a great one!

[kelley1]

thank you, it was.

[emilyhuh]

Happy Belated birthday @kelley1 ! Sorry that I’m so late!

[rbtdanforth]

Happy Birthday @rebecca!

[High_Latitude]

Woot!

[rappee25407]

Happy Cake Day @High_Latitude. Two years already. Glad you are a part of the forum.

Debbie

[dklgood]

Two years of laser fun. Happy cakeday.

[rbtdanforth]

Congratulations!

[rbtdanforth]

Happy cake day @ellencadwell

[emilyhuh]

Happy Cake Day @ellencadwell!! Yay!!

And Happy belated Cake Day @High_Latitude !!

Thank you both for all that you do on the forum!

[kelley1]

Hi there, @ellencadwell , Happy Cake Day!

[rappee25407]

Let me add my wishes for a happy cake day too @ellencadwell. Thanks for all your help.
Debbie

[ellencadwell]

Thank you everyone! I didn’t even realize it was my cake day! But my poor machine keeps giving me an “air assist” error today and I’ve been unable to do anything on it. I’ve cleaned the air assist really good, made sure it was seated properly, etc. I’ve taken the necessary photos and submitted a report to Support.

[deirdrebeth]

Just in case - does your “cleaning really well” include putting a pipe cleaner or something like that through the chute? I ask because stuff gets clogged in there and it’s not visible!

[ellencadwell]

No, I didn’t think of the pipe cleaner. I did use a little air blower I have and “dusted it out”. The fan seemed to turn really well. I’ll look again though and try the pipe cleaner. Thanks.

[rbtdanforth]

Back in my early days with the Glowforge I did not realize what the magnets were doing to the air assist and thought it was the fan getting clogged. So I rigged the end of a vacuum cleaner hose around the outfllow and with the vaccum cleaner going it would spin up the fan and by pouring the hand sanitizer directly on the fan it would dissolve all the gunk and immediately leave the machine via the vaccum hose. As I left the vaccum running for a half hour or more after, there was no trace of the sanitizer remaining and the fan was as clean as new.

This was the before shot of the fan…

[ellencadwell]

@deirdrebeth, I tried the pipe cleaner and it worked! My machine is running once again! Thank you for this tip. Yeah, a lot of gunk came out.

@rbtdanforth - that may be something I might try at another time. I think leaving the vacuum running that long kinda puts me off though. Wouldn’t rubbing alcohol work just as well to do that kind of cleaning? Although I know rubbing alcohol is a major ingredient in hand sanitizer, what do they put in it to make it more gel-like? I would think that wouldn’t help with the gumming up.

[rbtdanforth]

@ellencadwell

Although I know rubbing alcohol is a major ingredient in hand sanitizer,

The problem is that they add methanol (sometimes? always?) which is what shatters acrylic. In addition, the “gellness” helps keep enough volume in place to allow the crud to dissolve. Also, as it is supposed to be kind to hands, it seems to be kinder to the wood as well. I experimented quite a bit back in the day and others may prefer other things, but that is my thinking.

I could not swear to it but if there was any residue, it kept the gunk from sticking a bit longer. I have not seen any other evidence that it had been used.

[ellencadwell]

Thanks for the explanation!

[pubultrastar]

Happy Birthday @trually!